What do I need to do to get started making 3D models of aircraft?
A good place to get general advice is Blenderartists.org forums. Blender Stack Exchange is more for questions that can be answered fully and the answers should be based on facts and not opinions. So I will try to talk about some facts here, but obviously the answer will not follow the guidelines of the platform, that's going to be mostly my opinion.
It is a fact that you need to know what you are modelling in order to model it.
&quot;Know&quot; here might mean a few things: imagine, see, have some specifications, technical drawings and so on. Reference data is often underestimated. Do you need 3 views? I would say no, the views are not what you need, they are just the means of getting what you need, which is understanding, seeing, knowing the shapes and forms you need to model. This basically means that you need absolutely everything you are able to get about the object you are modelling: blueprints, technical drawings photos, videos, measurements, 3d scans - whatever you can get.
You also need skills to do 3d modelling
It's probably a very good idea to start learning with a specific project that gives you the motivation, but it is still necessary to familiarize yourself with the basics and tools available to you before jumping into it. You will find many great tutorials online on YouTube or elsewhere. See: https://www.blender.org/support/ for start - it is actually very useful. I would suggest going through all the items in the menus and making sure you understand what they do - that helps. I am talking about Object menu:

and all the menus and sub-menus in the 3d viewport's header that you get if you enter edit mode of a mesh:

That will get you started faster.
I would also advice starting learning modelling with something more simple than a plane and something that you can have in your hands while modelling and could also make all the reference images you need yourself. Lack of reference data is a big problem when modelling so when you start you might want to get it out of the way completely at first until you learn the tools at least. I see many beginners struggle with things advanced users would absolutely struggle too if they worked with the same amount of reference data. Good modellers know this and address this issue and that's why they are able to get better results easier.
You also need time and patience
You mentioned you have plenty of time - so that's great. I would just like to mention it because it is often a surprise just how much of it you need to learn and do this. There is probably going to be a lot of doing and re-doing stuff and re-doing it again at the beginning. This might get frustrating at times. I think it is important to know that this is how it goes - it's normal, and if you get frustrated during the process, you are doing it right. I do 3d modelling as part of my job every day for a while now and it still sometimes gets me - I fail and get frustrated from time to time. It's important to carry on and keep working until the job is done despite of it.